Heart of the Wolf

His eyes burning with anger

“She trusts you.”
Argos winced. The old leader didn’t like the idea of returning her to Volan any more than Devlyn did, but she wouldn’t be safe on her own. Worse, she threatened the secrecy of their kind with her rash decisions. She belonged to their pack for safe keeping, period.
“You were like a father to her. She was happy with us until Volan took over,” Devlyn continued. “She’ll come to you.”
“I know what you want, but you can’t have her.”
“Nobody can have her. Not while she’s got this insane notion of finding a human to love. Why does Volan want her so badly? She’ll make a lousy alpha female mate when she despises him so. He can’t lock her up or force her to mate with him.”
Argos raised his brows, but remained silent

Devlyn stared at the inky sky from the balcony of his hotel room, his heart pounding furiously as he considered how Bella had been locked up in the zoo. He never thought he’d see her again, but she was even more beautiful than before, if that was possible. He recognized the longing in her whisky-colored eyes. Save me, they pleaded. And the smell of her—wild and ripe for the picking.
God, how he wanted to claim her heart and body for his own

Bella lifted her snout and howled. She howled for the loss of freedom, for the loss of her red wolf family, for missing the affection of the grays who had taken her in, and for the love she felt for Devlyn—a hopeless, pitiful fondness for a lupus garou she could never have as a mate

worst way she wanted him to mate with her, to fulfill the unquenchable craving that the sight of him sparked, to take her for his own, his mate forever.
“She knows him, all right, don’t you think, Joe

She turned her attention back to Devlyn. He looked kissable. He’d filled out into a man-sized hunk, but his eyes remained dark and foreboding—even more so now.
Devlyn tilted his chin up as if taunting her to tell him what she thought of him, but he continued to stroke the bars. She realized then he smelled she was in heat. The urge to mate with her would be as natural to him as breathing the air or blinking an eye.
Her gaze met his, the depths of his eyes smoldering with lust. Then he scowled and turned away. He strode off, his long gait taking him away from her within seconds. She wanted to scream at him to set her free. But in the worst way she wanted him to mate with he

ng of his hard embrace, and now he stood across the moat from her in the flesh. Her heart beat so hard it was sure to bruise her ribs. Adrenaline coursed through her body at breakneck speeds, the thought that he’d come to free her giving her hope. What she wouldn’t give to nip him in the neck, to tackle him and force him to the ground. To have his heated kisses, his firm touch embracing her with wanton desire.

When he looked up, his blue eyes widened, and he straightened his back. He motioned with his head toward the railing. “In fact, there’s the man, right there.”
She turned to look at the railing, and her heart nearly stopped.
“See what I mean? It’s like she understands everything we say.”
Staring at Devlyn, she couldn’t unlock her gaze from him. So many lonely years, dreaming

Standing naked, she shivered, then breathed in the heavenly scent of pine needles, the smell once again triggering the memory of Devlyn kissing her. No man since had kissed her like he had.
She gritted her teeth and swallowed hard. He stirred primal longings in her too strong to quench. The desire to feel him deep inside her, filling her with his seed, producing their offspring, their family—sharing a lifetime commitment as mates forever—overwhelmed her. But he wasn’t the leader of the pack. Even if she wanted Devlyn for her mate, she didn’t think he’d ever be strong enough to have her. Yet, she couldn’t help but keep in touch with Argos, the old former leader of the pack. Knowing Devlyn was alive and well.

She would be the right age to be Volan’s mate, if he ever found her. Smiling at how clever she had been to avoid him, the smile faded as a coyote howled. She wasn’t meant to be a rogue wolf, living alone without a pack. Some were naturally geared that way. Not her.
More than that, Devlyn still held her heart hostage, damn him. She could still feel the way his strong fingers had gripped her shoulders with possessiveness, smell his feral craving to have her, feel his heart thundering when he crushed her against him. Why couldn’t he have run with her?
She shook her head, trying to clear her thoughts of the one who’d possessed her soul since the beginning